It may have looked like a bit of kids' stuff, a minor scuffle between a little bloke in a daft flowerpot man's hat and a dandy in a waistcoat, but when Ricky Hatton got into a spot of argy bargy at the MGM Grand, he looked into Floyd Mayweather's eyes and swore he saw fear.

For this was the moment Hatton's patience finally snapped.

Just one push and a sweeping cut-throat gesture from Manchester's challenger told of a man who'd had his fill of being patronised and abused by a preening champion and his camp. So it was that Hatton gave Mayweather the symbolic message: "You won't f****** push me back, and you won't in the ring, either."

Hatton had thought back to his promotional tour with Mayweather, during which he had responded to relentless name-calling in five cities by being a model of good humour, responding with only a weary smile and a few good oneliners.

Yet now the fight was only three days away and when the pair came nose to nose for the obligatory pre-bout eyeballing session, Hatton felt it was time to assert himself in one last mind game. He wasn't, he said, here to "f*** around".

Yet this one had been particularly wearisome, what with Mayweather irritated by England's football trumpet band serenading him cheekily with "Steptoe and Son" and Hatton being forced to listen to one of uncle Roger Mayweather's mad rambles about how the Briton was just a piece of "litter" to be swept up by his nephew.

Still, it was all still fairly civilised as the Hit Man launched into his stand-up act. After his trainer Billy Graham had feigned falling asleep listening to his counterpart, Hatton started with, "First, I'd like to thank Roger for making the winter shorter," and concluded with, "Now I'll hand the mike over to Bruce Almighty."

The Mayweathers were the only ones not amused.

Which is why Hatton is convinced Mayweather felt he had to do something to regain a psychological edge. In the stareout, with Hatton's nose burrowing into Mayweather's upper lip, they just stared maniacally for so long that it was uncomfortable watching. After about three minutes, neither could dare be seen to appear to lose face so Mayweather, slightly taller, tried to lean on Hatton.

"I pushed him back and he didn't like it,î said Hatton, who ended up offering the cut-throat gesture as he was being pulled away by some of his team.

"I'd have stood there and stared until the bell rang on Saturday night but when I leaned on him back, he spat his dummy out and started going, 'Don't touch me, don't touch me'. Then I gave him a little bit of the 'you're dead'

gesture."

Being the charmer he is, Ricky then had to explain: "Not literally, you understand... "

No wonder Bernard Hopkins, the 'Executioner' himself, was so impressed. One of the world's great fighters reckoned he could see a touch of fear in Mayweather.

"I think he's right," said Hatton. "For a guy like Mayweather, who lives off confidence so much and the mind games he plays, that would have hurt him much more than me."

On the contrary, Mayweather didn't sound at all annoyed.

In fact, he reckoned later that you only know it's a big fight when you can feel the tension even at the pre-fight conference. This fight has now got such an epic feel to it that Mark Taffet, the pay-per-view chief of fight broadcasters HBO, held it up as being the "crowning triumph" of the year which has seen boxing "reinvigorated, revitalised and returned to its rightful place in sport's landscape".

The theme was picked up by both fighters, who even stopped the trash talking for a minute to declare that "boxing will be the winner on Saturday".

In a year when top fighters were making a welcome new habit of engaging, rather than avoiding, each other - from Oscar De La Hoya v Mayweather to Joe Calzaghe v Mikkel Kessler - this bout, reckoned Hatton's dad and manager Ray, was proof that "boxing is still the premier sport out there for excitement".

It was when Hatton came here for his first Vegas fight in January against Juan Urango that veteran promoter Bob Arum pronounced that the Mancunian could be the man to help save professional boxing in the United States.

"The way he is, the way he fights and behaves outside the ring, gives me hope for the future of boxing," Arum said.

Even though Hatton could only labour to victory that weekend, Arum's vision of a people's champion, a blue collar heroic throwback who has won over boxing's capital here with effortless charm, remains just as realistic now if Hatton can upset the Vegas odds which have Mayweather as a 2-5 favourite.

De La Hoya, the fight promoter who should recognise a golden boy, sees a

sportsman with untold potential to be a global superstar.

"I've never seen a fighter so popular," he said. "Especially coming out of England, this is incredible. What Ricky Hatton is doing is wonderful for the sport."

That's the beauty of this contest. There is another school here who believe that the real standard bearer has to be an American with sugary skills, a touch of old fashioned dazzle and a loud mouth.

Take your pick. The comedian with the floppy hat and T-shirt; or the braggart with the waistcoat and the bling.